Jan Eliasson, the president of the U.N. general assembly announced on Nov. 23 that the new Human Rights Commission will be formed by the end of the year, and will be ready to be functioning by the next Summit in September. Eliasson and the team that is working on hashing out the details of the new Human Rights Council expect to start meeting next week to negotiate the details of the new body, and expect these to be finalized by the end of the year.
But herein lies the problem. The U.N. General Assembly, when it had its Summit in September, was unable to agree on the council’s size and on the criteria for membership. These critical negotiations were left to a later date, and still have not been resolved. What’s more, even Mark Malloch Brown, chief of staff to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan has warned that the design of a new council needs to be finalized by December if it is to be ready by Eliasson’s time line.
Despite Eliasson’s affirmations that this is possible, drawing up the details and achieving consensus are near impossible by the deadline he has set. Expectations for the new Human Rights Council are so different, based on whom they are coming from, that lengthy negotiations must be undertaken before the terms are agreed upon. John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. wants to replace the 53-member commission with a council with no more than 30 members. The members of the new Council should also have a solid human rights record, he has said.
Such a council faces opposition from several countries, particularly the human rights violators Bolton and Eliasson have made clear will not be welcome on the new Human Rights Council.
Yet Eliasson and his team believe that by December, they can draw up the details of the Human Rights Council and bring about consensus within U.N. members on these points. Whether it happens or not remains to be seen.
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why don't you tell us some more on what this council would do?
I personally don't think that it is possible to have 30 members on this council. The GA is a universal, international body. You cannot really throw out some members of this council as HR is a universal concern. It is a theoretically weak proposition.
As for who you will leave out, you think the US, the world's biggest violator of HR will allow itself to be left out? More important, I dont even think they will let this happen given that they have managed to stay out of the international court systems.
This is going to be interesting. Do give us some more info on what they plan to be doing, and what their overall purpose is.
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